The Good News is God's way to restore what sin has destroyed. Jewish tradition has a relevant phrase that communicates this idea: Tikkun Olam, or "repairing the world." God wants the world restored to His purpose and not merely recreated in our own image.

The triune God created us in His image to rule creation. Today, ruling may suggest domination. But pre-sin, ruling was a responsibility best seen in Adam's gardener-training phase by cultivating and keeping, that is, to serve and protect. The surprise is that in creating Adam in His own image, the Lord then proclaimed that it is not good for man to live alone. We best represent God in loving relationships. These loving relationships are most effectively seen in a caring community—a loving group, not a lone hermit.

We see this loving relationship re-emphasized by the command that the Lord gave Adam and Eve to "be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it." From the beginning, "God blessed them," not just him or her. Adam and Eve were blessed in relationship together. They were created with complete dependence on their Creator to fulfill His will.

However, their impact upon the world as His representatives was not yet a restoration, redemption or salvation issue; it preceded their sin. Our faithful service is to represent God for who He is through His word regardless of the world's condition. It is only with the catastrophic fall in Genesis 3 that we have Tikkun Olam. The purpose of Tikkun Olam is to restore this sin-ruined world; that is, to restore our severed relationship to God and our divided community with each other. When sin necessitated redemption, God promised a Redeemer from "the seed of the woman."

God focused the promise through His covenant to give Abraham a land, a people, and a blessing, so that in his seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed. The Covenant promises moved Abraham to have a blessed impact on his world. In the midst of pagan Canaan, Abraham "called upon the name of the Lord," thus applying Tikkun Olam. So also, in representing God, Abraham took disciple-making seriously with the 318 servants (or literally, "dedicated ones," or chanikav) that "were born in his house." This community of disciples shared in his urgent Tikkun Olam service.

In the Prophets, Tikkun Olam takes on a national urgency, like a responsible watchman warning the Jewish community of impending judgment.